Rockhopper

Never boring, Rockhopper presents itself with a subversive glint in its eye.

A weathered shape naturally softens at its edges. Continued overpainting of cast letters will clog and disfigure the outline. Illuminated letters will blur through halation. I consider the rounded sans a result of applied processes such as these, and different processes leave their mark in different ways. I’m always keen to design a type that can take advantage of technology, and where possible to question preconceptions of what type is, how it appears and how it is used.

Rockhopper is two typefaces in one. Firstly, it’s a rounded sans designed to function well on the high resolution screens used today. Secondly, it explores the potential of cumulative swashes – from single to overkill. [fig 1]

3. Drawing for Royal Prussian Railways lettering, 1897, detail

However, there is a more mannered approach to the rounded sans. In developing FF DIN Round, its designer Albert-Jan Pool researched the mechanical origins of the rounded effect given to letters. The resulting type has a more engineered and systematic look; one that can be found in the lettering developed by the Prussian Railways and subsequently followed through to the DIN Standard. [fig 3]

6. Windsor, 1905, Stephenson Blake & Co. Ltd

The effect that a rounded type imparts can be achieved through other means; such as by crudely making a letterform. This can be seen in Crawhall’s Chap-book Chaplets. The same method is also used by the Beggarstaff Brothers to letter their posters in the 1890s. At the turn of the 20th century there was a proliferation of typefaces mimicking this style; Roycroft, Blanchard, Buffalo to name a few from America; all aspiring to capture the eye with an immediate and ‘homespun’ appearance. It’s easy to suggest that this approach, to some degree, begins a progression toward the organic qualities of typefaces by George Auriol, especially Robur (1907) and Eleisha Pechey’s Windsor (1905). Which in turn prompts us to consider Cooper Black (1922) by Oswald Cooper. It can be seen that this style of letter becomes more considered over time. And, following a stylistic break, it makes a return in the Sixties as a design choice reflecting the social changes happening then. [figs 4–9]

7. An example of Oswald ‘Oz’ Cooper’s lettering from 1914 that was later made famous as the typeface Cooper Black

Designing in harmony with technology
It seems logical and sensible to design a typeface as it should finally appear. The appearance of the type image is something that always occupied type designer Gerard Unger. Markeur (1972) was a letter designed to be produced by routing. It took advantage of an offset second pass to create a slightly thicker vertical stroke – which resulted in an optically better letter. The rounded terminals are a natural side effect of routing. A couple of years later Unger designed the Amsterdam Metro typeface (M.O.L.) with rounded features. These were incorporated to anticipate the optical effect of halation caused by back illuminated signs. [figs 10, 11]

This understanding of using the limits (or potential) of technology gave Unger a fresh approach in his design of type. An opportunity came to take his ideas further when he developed a typeface for the Hell Digiset. In a similar way to halation caused by back illumination, the process of phototypesetting softens the type image. Unger’s approach was to design a typeface that made soft details the principal feature. The process required editing pixels on a grid to best render the desired effect. The final type, Demos, also gave rise to the future designs of Praxis and Flora. [figs 12, 13, 14]

12. Different ways to render a curve using bitmaps on the Digiset, Gerard Unger, 1975
(Coll. Allard Pierson, University of Amsterdam)

13. Drawings for Praxis, Gerard Unger, 1976(Coll. Allard Pierson, University of Amsterdam)

14. Pixellated drawings for Praxis, Gerard Unger, 1976(Coll. Allard Pierson, University of Amsterdam)

Enter Rockhopper
So where does this bring us in regard to Rockhopper? I was keen to design a sans that would balance the mechanical structure found in the industrial types with the softness and warmth of the organic types of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Anticipating the final image of a typeface has always interested me. Some of my past type designs have explored various ways to subtly modify their image when set. Kingfisher incorporated a slight lean and optical wobble in order to keep the line of text alive. The Trilogy fonts bear blunt chamfers to all corners, in an attempt to reduce the visual sharpness increasingly apparent on our high resolution screens. Although angular and expressionist, all the strokes that bend in Brucker use curves, to add a touch of warmth without breaking their flow.

When planning Rockhopper I listed several approaches that could contribute to a final visual impression of softness. (1) Softness can be interpreted by rounding edges – this could be just a corner or the whole terminal. (2) Tone can be used to soften an edge in the same way it is used to create a 3D illusion as in the typeface Calypso. (3) Choice of shape – use simpler letter shapes such as round a and cursive g. (4) Use open shapes and a fuller proportion to evoke a more comfortable and flowing appearance. (5) Calligraphic details could impart softness, but this may also reduce the balance between industrial and organic. (6) The effects of media, production and technology used – such as letterpress squash, casting, overpainting, digital display. [figs 15–18]

The last point particularly interested me. For many years, digital type has been limited by the resolution of the hardware. It hasn’t necessarily been of primary concern, as the end result for type has usually been off-screen. But it’s easily argued that the digital display is now the principle environment where type exists. Current displays are now at a high enough resolution to render the subtlest of details. To take advantage of this the design grid for Rockhopper was doubled. By doing so, more detail can be achieved and the rendering of shallow curves maintained. [fig 19]

20. This image, repoduced from Albert-Jan Pool’s article in Typo 42, shows the visual bump where a curve joins a straight. The image on the right has been visually corrected to remove this optical effect

A visually annoying effect often occurs in digital type design where a curve joins a straight line – a bump appears at this juncture. Each rounded terminal becomes an obvious attachment to its stem; rather than being seamlessly integrated as part of a continuous stroke. It goes without saying that a rounded sans style compounds these effects as every detail relies on a curve joining a straight. [fig 20]

21. A soft outside contrasted with a sharp internal junction

To avoid this there are no straight lines in Rockhopper; all the stems swell a little at their centre and taper toward their terminals. The increase in the design grid allows these shallow curves to be maintained and to visually flow continuously into their terminal details. [figs 21–25]

30. Initials letters designed by Henry van de Velde, 1896

Beyond Art Nouveau there are of course many examples of flourishes and fluid lines. They are generally calligraphic and integral to a letter’s structure – being a continuation of a stroke. I was less interested in this approach and more keen to find examples of an attached element. Here, they are more akin to a flourish, but without the heavy copperplate overtone. Some examples from history include the attached element to the p in an alphabet written by U. Wyss, and the attached tail to the leg of R, also by Wyss. A variety of lively elements adorning letters can be seen in a 1618 inscription on a monument in Ledbury Church, Herefordshire. [figs 31, 32, 33]

34. A ‘top’ anchor on a lowercase n with a selection of accents shown as an ‘anchor cloud’ above (left), n with tilde accent placed using anchors (right)

Making this idea useable through today’s technology was not without issues. I wanted to borrow the concept of anchors (used to place accents on letters) and use this to place the swashes. The principle is that an anchor is added to a letter and another anchor to an accent. Both are then combined and the accent snaps to the pre-described position on the letter. [fig 34] Type designer’s routinely use this approach to extend a font’s character set. In essence one accent is designed which is re-used across many different letters for many different languages. Extending this idea, I imagined a set of swash elements able to be applied to all manner of characters, and in all manner of combinations. I added 14 special anchors to create a ‘swash cloud’, from which one, two, or various combinations of swashes can be turned on – even all of them, in a feature called 'Overkill’. [figs 35–38]

37. The ‘swash cloud’ surrounding the Rockhopper Black capital H

OpenType fonts are very clever and can have extended typographic ability, all accessed through what are called OpenType features; the general interface for which is pretty poor and inconsistent – we forever live in hope that this improves. One of these OpenType features is called Stylistic Sets, which comprises of up to 20 individual options. I routinely use Set 1 for Nut Fractions and Set 2 for Barless Fractions, and Rockhopper is no different. This leaves 18 sets available for swash use. In addition to the Swash feature used on its own or in combination with Stylistic Alternates to turn on a range of swashes.

The original idea was to use each Stylistic Set to apply a different swash, clockwise around a character. So you could turn on Sets 3, 6, 9, 15, 18 and obtain a character with 5 swashes attached around its shape. Unfortunately the technology to build this the way I wanted, failed. Although the principle worked there were problems with line breaking, inserting the cursor, and selecting a specific character to edit.

38. Swashes can be applied to any character

In the end I used the anchors to build all the different glyphs available through all the different OpenType options. This meant decisions had to be made as to which swashes would appear on which sets of characters. As it is, the end result is better and easier to use. There are Stylistic Sets to apply single, double, and triple swashes to letters, figures, and sorts. A couple of Sets offering lots of swashes as well as one for overkill; which applies all the swashes to capital A–Z and lining 0–9 to create a highly ornamental set. [fig 39]

When in use, happy accidents occur and swashes clash with each other as well as with neighbouring characters, creating a vibrant and unique visual texture. It’s these swashes that give rise to the typeface name – Rockhopper – after the penguin with a nifty hair do.

When my daughter started secondary school the principal gave a talk about educating the students for the future. The point made was that the careers they may end up with hadn’t yet been invented. I like that. I like the idea that the future isn’t set and anything is possible. In a similar way I like designing type for potential uses that haven’t yet been dreamt up. Ultimately it’s up to the calibre of the user to explore, play, experiment and create the use.